On 2011/02/22 13:55 (GMT-0800) Kevin A. Cameron composed:
Anything between 10px and 25px can be appropriate for main copy depending on
There's no ceiling. Screen pixel density has been climbing and will continue to climb. It takes 32px @ 192 DPI to make 12pt (IE's default size, which is 2pt bigger than the minimum recommended for legibility[1]). On a 192 DPI display, 10px is less than 4pt.
it's usage. You can't accommodate all users.
Actually WRT text you can accommodate at least 97% (probably more like 99.9%) of those who can see, automatically, as that's what browsers were and are designed to do since before CSS existed.
Also, it's easier to not try to control the uncontrollable (the user has ultimate control: zoom, minimum, user CSS, turning off your styles entirely, back button, etc). The more control you attempt to apply, the more the CSS weighs, and the more trouble it is to debug and maintain.
Where you declare font-size and what size it is, is not as important as it being able to scale up/down properly in the browser (ie, not breaking the layout when a user does this).
Actually as long as being rude is acceptable, you're right. However polite designs incorporate the user's choice as best size as set via her browser's default. No user should need to scale up or down, as the browser does that automatically as long as the design is accepting of the user's previously determined best size. [2]
Line height, font-face/weight, letter spacing, colour, line width and rag can all play a factor in how readable your text is
Exactly, though collectively with size as applied on today's web they more often serve to reduce legibility than to improve it. e.g., more line height is added to make text "more readable", after the size has been reduced to make it less readable, when standard size (determined by the visitor) and standard line height (determined by the font's author) are typically as close to perfect as can be had. [3]
[1] http://www.useit.com/alertbox/20020819.html [2] http://fm.no-ip.com/Auth/rudeweb.html [3] http://fm.no-ip.com/Auth/bigdefaults.html -- "How much better to get wisdom than gold, to choose understanding rather than silver." Proverbs 16:16 NKJV Team OS/2 ** Reg. Linux User #211409 Felix Miata *** http://fm.no-ip.com/ ______________________________________________________________________ css-discuss [css-d@lists.css-discuss.org] http://www.css-discuss.org/mailman/listinfo/css-d List wiki/FAQ -- http://css-discuss.incutio.com/ List policies -- http://css-discuss.org/policies.html Supported by evolt.org -- http://www.evolt.org/help_support_evolt/
